Social media has revolutionised the way that small businesses market themselves, and with millions of people glued to their screens each day, there’s never been a better time or way to promote your products and services. However, with so many businesses vying for customer attention on social media, it is important to know how to promote and differentiate your brand, and the right approach to take to get the best results.
Furthermore, social media is a very diverse field and you can’t use the same approach for every platform. LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok are all social media platforms, but each are used by very different demographic and for different purposes – your social media content and marketing strategy must be tailored accordingly in order to connect with your target audience.
In this article, we’ll look at some basic strategies for getting your business noticed through social media marketing.
The essence of social media marketing is to engage in an ongoing direct dialogue with your audience, which necessitates a two-way conversation. It isn’t sufficient to simply post content and hope for the best. You’ll need to actively engage with your followers by responding to their comments, answering their questions, and addressing their concerns. These informal interactions, over and above your formal social media content and advertising strategy, will go a long way to building firm business relationships and strengthening customer loyalty.
The average social media feed is a crowded place, so to grab your audience’s attention, your content must be tailored to resonate with their pain points, interests, and goals. Before engaging in social media marketing, therefore, you need to do your research and figure out what type of content your users are most likely to engage with. Depending on the platform and your target demographic, this could be anything from industry news, tips and tricks, or even funny memes and videos. There is no set-in-stone way to do this; the key is to make your content and value proposition meaningful and relevant within the accepted norms and conventions of the social media platform you are using.
In the age of information overload, people generally have short attention spans, which is why it’s important with social media marketing to use visual content to grab people’s attention and keep them interested. Again, depending on the platform, this could include images, videos, and even infographics to convey your message more effectively and creatively. Original imagery generally works better on social media than stock images – just be sure to keep your visual media relevant and appropriate to your brand and audience, as well as clear and of high quality.
For the best results and to maximise your reach, you should consider promoting your content across multiple social media platforms. This doesn’t mean attempting to use them all. For most businesses, there are maybe two or three platforms that their ideal customers use, with one being the primary platform. For example, most B2B businesses focus most of their efforts on LinkedIn, because this is the main platform their target customers use, but it’s also worthwhile adapting their content for Facebook and Twitter to catch the same audience at different times. A B2C ecommerce business, on the other hand, may want to focus more on Instagram, Pinterest, and/or TikTok for their content. When using multiple platforms, remember to adapt the content to each platform and its audience, with each channel providing the opportunity to showcase your brand from a different angle.
To help you determine which strategies work best for your business on social media, be sure to track and measure your performance for every post, update, and advert. You can measure metrics such as engagement rates, social shares, post reach, click-through rates, and more, depending on your campaign goal. Most social media platforms now include inbuilt analytics tools that can help you make informed decisions on your content strategy and improve your results from social media marketing.
For more information about how to manage social media for business, and how to build a stronger brand on your chosen platforms, please book a call with one of JDR Group's social media experts today.
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